Manawatu Evening Standard TUESDAY, SEPT. 24, 1935. AMERICA’S LAND LOSS.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LV, Issue 254, 24 September 1935, Page 6

Manawatu Evening Standard TUESDAY, SEPT. 24, 1935. AMERICA’S LAND LOSS.

Grave warnings are being issued by American authorities against the national danger that ires in the devastation of the soil. Recently, a survey compiled by Federal authorities was mentioned in the news. It revealed that 51 million acres had been essentially destroyed by wind and water erosion to the extent that the land no longer was fit for crop production; yet most of it. at one time comprised good soil. Simultaneously, Mr Morris L. Cooke, one of the most distinguished of American engineers, warned the nation that, if exploitation of the soil continued as at present, in 50 years there would be a total area of really fertile lands not much more than three times the size of Nebraska, and “unless there is a marked change in the present methods of agriculture we have as a nation less than 100 years to go.” Such woixls are ominous, and there is much in history to at least give them a backing. Mr Cooke has lost no opportunity to stress the danger. Making the same statement in a paper read before the annual convention of the American Waterworks Association last May, he 'emphasised the point that if the nation is “to win out against the accelerated progression of this gangrenous growth of soil erosion, then we have less than 20 years in which to build up the techniques, to recruit the fighting personnel, and to change the attitude of millions of people who hold that ownership of land carries with it the right to mistreat, and even to destroy their land, regardless of the effect on the total national estate.” The last point is of paramount importance. In the course of settlement land has lost its fertility through excessive cropping after the removal of its protective covering. In dry seasons the wind has swept away the powdered surface, as happened in numerous districts only recently, and the soil is reduced to a poor physical condition. When the rains come it is easily washed away or else loses its valuable soluble salts. Since America was settled, it has been estimated by a leading American authority on economic geography, an area has been denuded of its surface soil equal to the total area of cultivated land in Germany. But American farmers for long disregarded the danger ; land was plentiful and easy to acquire. As an area lost its fertility they moved further westward , regardless of the amount of abuse to which the land was subjected. As Mr Cooke says, particularly in the decades since 1900 the American people have pillaged their soils. In addition to land destroyed by wind and water 105 million acres have lost the top soil and consequently much of its productivity. The fact is that America is not a permanent country, with rainfall and conditions which give stability to soil in Northern Europe. It is rather a land like Northern Africa where splendid Roman cities remain as ruins to show that the economic basis for their existence has been in’ some manner withdrawn, a commentator remarks on the subject. There lias been little if any evidence to support the view of climatic changes in Northern Africa; the decline of these ancient cities came about through ignorance and lack of foresight in the treatment of the soil. So the desert advanced to overwhelm a once fertile country. The same process is going on in French and British Nigeria and in the French Sundan where, it is stated, valuable agricultural land is being conquered and absorbed by the Sahara Desert at an alarming rate. In America Governments are

becoming- alive to tlie clanger and are taking action to preserve tlie soil. Tlie planting of a great belt of trees 1000 miles long and 100 miles broad stretching from tlie Texas border to Canada is a Federal enterprise, while the Tennessee Talley undertaking will also embrace soil preservation over a wide area. This is evidence of an awakened public conscience. Past losses cannot be repaired, but much can be done to check the disaster that threatens the nation if Mr Cooke’s words have any meaning at all.